


slow dive into loving you

by orphan_account



Category: Twenty One Pilots
Genre: F/F, F/M, M/M, hey look i wrote something happy for once
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-07-27
Updated: 2015-07-27
Packaged: 2018-04-11 11:05:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,832
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4433123
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>a break-up, a party, some taco bell, the x-files, accidentally moving in together, a cigarette, feelings left unspoken for a bit too long, and a wedding. things are a little bit weird, but it's okay in the end.</p>
            </blockquote>





	slow dive into loving you

**Author's Note:**

> ok idk how long it took how to write this thing but it was done in one sitting so it probably makes no sense and i apologize for that but major shoutout to my homeboy destery for watching me write the entire thing over join.me  
> he's the best okay and he gives me so much of my inspiration for writing, i'm very lucky to have him in my life i love him
> 
> ok!! enjoy if you read, thank you so much if you do!! now i'm going to take a nap or something

Maybe it’s a little bit weird that Tyler is even contemplating showing up to the wedding of his childhood crush and first actual girlfriend.

First crush, first girlfriend, first love, first kiss, first _everything_. It had all been her and when she broke up with him, hiding her tear-stained cheeks underneath pink-painted nails, she told him that she had no regrets.

He didn’t, either, except maybe the fact that he was still in love with her long after they separated. The feelings never waned, locked inside his mind, every time he looked at her and she looked at him with a bright smile, all he could focus on was her lips and what it would feel like to kiss her again.

He didn’t do that, either, because he’s a respectful guy and his mother taught him right. Jenna had broken up with him for a reason, okay? He understood that, even if he didn’t understand why she couldn’t just give him that reason, tell him why exactly she had to break up with him in such a rush.

Tyler met that reason two weeks later, at a party Jenna had invited him to over the phone, promising him a good time. He didn’t want to go out, even if Josh and Mark and his mother and literally everyone else were begging him to stop moping around, but he did, all because of her.

He went, and he met the reason Jenna had decided they were better off as ‘just friends’. Maybe it hadn’t all been related to Debby at first, but once Tyler saw the emotion in Jenna’s eyes whenever they looked at each other, it was the same emotion that he would see mirrored in her eyes whenever they met gazes.

He looked between them, and his heart sank a little bit, but he shook Debby’s hand with a smile and kissed Jenna’s cheek and said, honestly, that he was happy that they’d found each other.

Jenna’s smile was sad but her eyes were anything else when she hugged him tightly against her chest, whispering that she was sorry, sorry, _sorry_.

He was sorry, too, for still being in love with her when her heart belonged to someone else. He talked until he couldn’t bear standing back and watching as Debby smiled at Jenna like she was the only person in the world, so he excused himself and found an unoccupied bathroom, locking himself inside.

Tyler fished his phone out of his pocket and he dialed numbers that he’d dialed hundreds upon hundreds of times before, numbers he’d memorized long ago, numbers that felt vaguely like _home_.

“Tyler?”

Josh’s voice is concerned and still tinged with sleep. He answers on the fourth ring, and Tyler smiles to himself, briefly, heart pounding in his chest, before he bursts into tears.

The line crackles with static as Josh shuffles around. “Tyler? What’s wrong?”

He _sobs_ , clutching his phone against his ear as Josh mumbles soothing things, waiting until he calms down. Once the tears begin to clear, he wipes at his face, huffing an embarrassed sigh at his partial breakdown in the bathroom of someone he didn’t even know.

“Can you come pick me up?” is the first thing he asks.

“Yeah, yeah,” Josh responds, immediate. “Where are you?”

When Tyler ends the call, he feels even worse when he looks at the time at the top of his screen – 2:09 AM. God, he must’ve woken Josh up with how pathetic he was acting. He slides down the wall he’s leaning against, head pounding, and closes his eyes, settling his phone into his lap until it buzzes a little over ten minutes later.

From: **Josh** , 2:24 AM

_I’m here_

He shuffles to his feet, shoves his phone into his pocket, and unlocks the door. As he’s leaving the house, he sees Jenna and Debby sitting on a couch, chatting and laughing and grinning; his heart twists uncomfortably, and he ducks his head, almost running in a hurry to get away from everything.

Josh, his saving grace, is leaned up against his car in the dark, blinking tiredly as Tyler rushes out of the house, full-out sprinting toward him. He crashes against him, arms tight around his waist, burying his head into his shoulder; Josh hugs him back, harshly, smoothing a hand down his back as Tyler begins to cry again, shivering.

It’s not quite as violent as the first time. His tears are silent, even if his whole body quivers, and Josh rocks him slightly, whispering into his ear that he’s fine, he’s fine, he’s okay, gently kissing his forehead from time to time.

Gradually, he does calm down, still clutching on to Josh until he’s sure all of his tears are dried up. He hiccups slightly as he pulls away, rubbing at his cheeks – Josh opens the passenger side door and ushers him inside, closing it silently behind him.

“Sorry it took me so long to get here,” Josh mumbles, yawning as he slides behind the wheel, looking at Tyler, and he wants to cry all over again purely at how much of a good soul his best friend is. “I’m gonna pick up Taco Bell, and we’re going to my apartment, and we can watch Netflix. Sound good?”

“Yeah,” Tyler mumbles honestly, curling in on himself. “Thank you.”

Josh asks no questions as he drives, ordering for himself and Tyler as he pulls into Taco Bell. Tyler figures, at the very least, he owes him an explanation as to why they’re currently ordering junk food to put into their systems in the dead of night, so he unfurls himself, stretching his legs out. “There’s a girl,” he says, dumbly, staring out the window at glowing streetlights and headlights of other cars passing by.

“A girl,” Josh clarifies, and Tyler snorts, rubbing at his eyes at just how stupid he sounds.

“Uh. Yeah. With Jenna. Kind of? I don’t really know what _they_ are, but there’s a girl. I think that’s why she broke up with me.”

Josh makes a humming sound, patting Tyler’s leg sympathetically. “I’m sorry,” he says, frowning, and Tyler turns to him, even if he doesn’t quite have the energy to smile.

“Thank you,” he says, and Josh grins at him, perfectly lopsided and beautiful.

“Sure.”

Two bags of food later and another quiet night drive, Josh is unlocking the door to his house, moving over to allow Tyler inside. Both bags are balanced precariously in his arms as he heads into the living room, flopping down onto the couch – Josh settles down next to him, kicking his feet up on the coffee table, retrieving food that Tyler hands him.

He turns on the TV and queues Netflix to The X-Files without question, biting into a taco as Tyler curls into his side. Instantly, he wraps his free arm around his shoulders, resting his head against the top of Tyler’s.

Somewhere along the line, Tyler falls asleep. He wakes up to silence around the apartment, brightness in his eyes, and Josh’s warmth missing from his side; he pulls himself off of the couch, and taco wrappers fall off of his lap and onto the floor. He reminds himself to clean them up later, and glances around, seeing the curtains to the balcony’s glass door pulled to the side.

Josh is standing outside, looking out over the edge, and Tyler slides the door open, slipping outside next to him. There’s a cigarette dangled between his index and middle fingers, lit and trailing smoke into the empty air.

“Hey,” he mumbles, looking curiously at the cigarette. “I haven’t seen you smoke since college.”

Josh smiles at him. His hair is a mess and he has bags under his eyes, but his smile is the same as always, crooked and wonderful. “I quit,” he replies, lifting it to his lips, taking a long, thoughtful drag, eyes closing as he breathes out smoke.

Tyler hums. He falls quiet, watching Josh smoke, and the early morning sunrise over the buildings.

 

+

 

Tyler spends the next few days at Josh’s apartment. He leaves to go to work in the morning but he always comes back in the afternoon, to Josh’s beaming face and an affectionate hug. Eventually, he runs out of clothes and Josh’s never seem to fit right, so he does have to go home.

He comes back the next day, though, with a bag stuffed with as many clothes as he could fit.

“Maybe you should move in,” Josh says when he sees the bag slung over Tyler’s shoulder.

He’s never considered moved in with anyone, aside from Jenna before they broke up, but he decides in an instant that yeah, maybe he should.

“Maybe I should,” he says, stoic, and Josh _laughs_.

“When should we pick up the rest of your things?”

It’s supposed to be a joke, at first. Tyler goes to his own apartment again after a few more days, but he comes right back with more of his clothes, and at this point, the longer he stays there, the more difficult it becomes to distinguish what belongs to who. They figure out who’s pants are who’s, because Tyler’s legs are longer and Josh’s thighs are a little bit chubbier, but shirts are a lost cause and are eventually a free-for-all.

It turns into more than a joke, somehow, when Josh asks over breakfast one morning, utterly serious, “Seriously, when are we picking up the rest of your things?” and Tyler responds, “Tomorrow would be fine.”

They don’t discuss it, falling asleep in Josh’s bed together tangled beneath sheets like every night (there’s another bedroom, but Tyler likes cuddling, and Josh doesn’t complain). The next day is a Saturday, a free day for the both, so Tyler calls a moving truck and arranges to have what he figures absolutely necessary moved into Josh’s apartment, and Josh goes along with it.

Slowly, everything becomes ‘ours’ instead of ‘mine’ or ‘yours’, and Josh doesn’t really mind.

When their friends see them on the street together, they wave and they say, “Hey, _JoshandTyler_ ,” their names slurring together. Tyler figures that they’re pretty much a package deal so he doesn’t really care, and Josh thinks it’s _adorable_.

It takes a couple months for Josh to begin to register whatever he feels for Tyler whenever he looks at him is the real deal. He says nothing, because he still needs to figure things out, and those feelings only get stronger.

Especially when Tyler looks over at him when he’s trying to sleep one night, smiling faintly in the darkness. “I kind of love you,” he says, and Josh yawns, breaking into a laugh.

“Well, I kind of love you, too,” Josh sighs, running his fingers through Tyler’s hair, even if it’s a lot more than ‘kind of’ at this point.

It’s terrifying for Tyler when he realizes with a start that he feels the same things for Josh that he felt for Jenna when they first began dating. He doesn’t hang out with Jenna nearly as often as he used to, but they’re still good friends, and her and Debby’s relationship has been going strong, slowly progressing. He drags Josh to everything he goes to when he meets up with the two, and they look between them like they know something they don’t, but he doesn’t bother trying to read too much into it.

It’s horrifying and it’s exciting and it’s maddening and everything all at once, so Tyler does what Tyler does best, and he distances himself out of fear.

“Have you been avoiding me?” Josh asks once as he stands over the coffee maker, and Tyler laughs, nervously.

“No?” he tries, but it sounds more like a question than a direct answer, and Josh sighs, leaning against the counter.

The look on his face instills fear in Tyler, so he fesses up. “Yeah.”

Josh rolls his eyes. “Why?”

Tyler glances at the clock on the wall, springing up. “I need to go to work!” he chirps, and nearly trips himself in his rush to get out of the kitchen and away from the situation. He knows that leaving words unsaid and the problem unsolved will do absolutely nothing, but he’s just not willing to admit anything yet.

He expects it to be brought up later when he gets home from work. Instead, after he toes off his shoes by the door and heads into the living room, he finds Josh curled up on the couch, fast asleep. He fetches a blanket from their shared bedroom and drapes it over him, plopping himself down beside him before turning on the TV.

Tyler’s pretty close to half asleep by the time Josh stirs, sitting himself up. He looks blearily at his surroundings, a sleepy, love-drunk smile gracing his features when he looks at Tyler; slowly, his smile fades, turning into an expression of hurt as he becomes more coherent.

“Why are you avoiding me?” he asks, and Tyler’s heart drops guiltily at just how upset he looks.

“I think I have feelings for you,” he responds, avoiding eye contact, and Josh sighs, dropping back against the couch.

“Yeah, me too.”

Tyler laughs, airily, resting his head against the back of the couch. His heart is still pounding out of fear, his head clearing out of relief that whatever he was feeling wasn’t unrequited. “I didn’t mean to avoid you,” he tells the ceiling.

Josh sighs, curling back up under his blankets. “I know.”

Tyler pats his thigh carefully, before settling himself behind Josh, draping an arm over his waist. His space is accommodated and Josh presses up against him, trying to diffuse whatever was left of uncertainty in the situation. There’s still a lot to be talked about, but he knows that can wait until a later time.

Josh falls off of the couch during the middle of the night, and Tyler laughs so hard he begins tearing up, and very nearly pees himself. In response, Josh heads into the bedroom and locks the door, trying to force himself to go back to sleep with Tyler pounding on the door, whining incoherently.

Eventually, he does let Tyler back inside, and they fall asleep wrapped around each other just like any other night.

The next morning, Tyler wraps Josh up in a hug before he leaves for work, pecking him softly on the cheek, and Josh smiles fondly at the gesture, walking him out the door.

As he sits at the table drinking his coffee, he figures he’s always known, somehow, that he’d fall in love with Tyler. Tyler finds it the same way as he drives himself to work, tapping out the beats to songs on the steering wheel; it took him a little bit longer, but he _knows_ when some cheesy love song comes on and he can relate every last lyric to the way he feels about Josh.

Tyler picks up Taco Bell on the way home. He places it on the kitchen table and Josh yells hello from where he’s holed up on the couch.

“I brought Taco Bell,” he calls back, and Josh cheers, rushing into the kitchen with a blanket around his shoulders.

When Josh sits down at the table, digging through bags for his food, the blanket slips down and Tyler can see that he’s wearing one of his (many) favorite hoodies.

He sits down next to him, crossing their ankles together, and gently pushes a taco out of Josh’s fingers. He grabs at his shoulders, dragging him toward him, and Josh smiles, albeit confused.

“Can I kiss you?” Tyler asks, and Josh laughs, bringing his hands up to Tyler’s face.

“Yeah,” Josh grins, the same perfectly lopsided one that he reserves just for Tyler, and carefully draws him in, kissing him softly.

Tyler breaks the kiss by laughing, brushing his nose against Josh’s, and even if he doesn’t really know why, he laughs, too.

Three weeks later, Tyler opens their mailbox in the lobby, and there’s a wedding invitation placed on top of the pile. He picks it up, confused, as most everyone he knows has already gotten married at this point, reading Jenna’s and Debby’s name.

He smiles to himself. It took them long enough; he _almost_ feels sick every time he sees the two together, they’re that adorably in love.

“What are you looking at?” Josh asks from behind him.

“Jenna and Debby are getting married,” Tyler sighs, handing over the invitation.

“Took them long enough,” Josh grins crookedly, and Tyler kisses him.

 

+

 

Maybe it’s a little weird that he’s dressing himself in a tux for his first girlfriend’s wedding, to a girl who has a smile like sunshine, who looks at Jenna like she’s the only thing on earth.

Yeah, it’s definitely a little weird, but he owes it to her for bringing him and Josh together after all those months trying to figure out what those strange feelings were for each other.

**Author's Note:**

> hmu on social media!  
> @blurryfced on tumblr  
> @blurryfceds on twitter


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